Though literally a term referring to the work produced during Queen Victoria's reign (1837-1901), Victorianism now exudes a whole slew of literary connotations (the word "prudish" may come to mind). The explosion of the middle class, the spread of education, and... [more]

Though literally a term referring to the work produced during Queen Victoria's reign (1837-1901), Victorianism now exudes a whole slew of literary connotations (the word "prudish" may come to mind). The explosion of the middle class, the spread of education, and tremendous strides in science and industry all created a hothouse effect on Western culture (although centered in England, similar cultural shifts occurred in the rest of the West). The intensity of these stabilizing forces cultivated an obsession with ambition and its attendant virtues: protocol, hard work, manners, and reserve. The modern idea of invention was born in this era -- the notion that solutions were attainable, that betterment was simply a matter of finding new instruction. In turn, Victorian literature articulated the triumphs and tribulations of this newly minted bourgeoisie. Though the movement subsumes the categories of Pre-Raphaelite, Gothic, and Realism, it retains its own distinctive flavor of social responsibility. As they wallowed in the heady power of "progress," Victorian writers attempted to do their part for the golden times. Many proved to be moralists, challenging social injustices with a paradoxically conservative tone. In "Wuthering Heights" (1847), the unequal social backgrounds of Emily Bronte's tormented lovers flesh out the class struggles occurring on a grander social scale. Charles Dickens chronicled the lower-class lives of those fueling the Industrial Revolution. Others such as Louisa May Alcott, Robert Browning, George Eliot, and Robert Louis Stevenson also represent the best of this vein: pride in the social and economic changes underfoot, and prejudice born out of the stifling mantle of respectability. Of course, some writers -- notably Oscar Wilde and Walter Pater -- realized Victoriana's glories in other ways, travelling an aesthetic (rather than moral) road to social perfection. [show less]